Watching
by Blue-with-purple-polka-dots
Summary: It wasn't just the Elements of Harmony which stopped Discord in his tracks or removed his powers and influence on Equestria. He knows where their true strength lies.


This will probably be eventually deciminated by canon what with an origin story coming up on the actual show. Oh well! Mostly just musings really rather than a story.

Have some vague inferences of Equestrian History and Discord! Was really a part of a longer story I abandoned. I apologise for any mistakes and I encourage you to give constructive criticism if you wish to do so. But I hope you like it in any case! It's been a while since I've done fanfic.

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><p>One thing which had to be realised was that while his physical body was locked away, encased in stone and unable to move, Discords mind never really was.<p>

As a 'spirit' he silently would watch and travel throughout the land, never to be seen, never to be directly felt by the ponies which frolicked below him, ignorant of his presence.

At least he _usually _wasn't directly felt by ponies. There were however, those few exceptions which always existed. Exceptions were the one thing which could always be counted on when Discord was involved.

He watched and observed and took in information. He'd seen, if not it all, then far more than any other being ever had including the two Alicorn princesses themselves. And after he was set in stone, he'd continued to watch. He'd seen the beginning of Celestia's and Luna's reign. The forming of countless pony settlements. The agreements and disagreements between ponies and other creatures from those between individuals to entire species and nations.

He was thought to have even helped form their world accidentally as a result of his own chaos, although whoever else may have played a part, if anything or anyone did at all, was unknown. And who (or what) had formed _him_ was another mystery in of itself. He was old, so much older than almost anything else, and no-one could guess his true age or even whether he'd always looked the way he did. It could be speculated perhaps he had gone by other names, had met other worlds and people, perhaps leaving his own unique mark on them before moving on. But no-one else could say for certain, and he was silent on the matter.

Discord was much more limited in his powers without his body. He could not cause cotton candy clouds and chocolate rain to form when his physical form was trapped. There were rules while he was without physical form that he couldn't break as much as he may have wanted to. However, hurricanes and tornados and other natural disasters were perfectly natural and within his abilities, and even in some cases (though Celestia was loath to admit it at the time) necessary. After all, forest and bush fires caused the land to become more fertile. Lightening itself also caused nitrogen to be released in the ground helping plants and thus all creatures which depended upon them. Storms uprooted trees giving smothered undergrowth a chance to see light and grow. Death was necessary to make room for other life to flourish. And so he was able to perform certain actions, being a cursed necessity while all ponies, even Celestia and Luna who trapped him had little clue as to the fact he was even the precise cause or it at all. For a time, the raising of the sun and moon was the only thing they could control.

The pegasi and, to a lesser extent, earth ponies had however eventually became his downfall in Equestria while he lacked a physical form. While it was the Alicorns magic, along with the help of some unicorns which had first distracted him with their magic thus reducing his power and trapping him initially, it was the pegasi and earth ponies with their knowledge and abilities in the skies and the ground which reduced his influence even further.

Pegasi shifted the skies and the clouds and exerted control on his perfectly natural chaos in the air. They chose when storms and lightening and rain would occur. This was something he had not even considered a possibility until they had found a way.

But even before the Pegasi had become a thorn in his side, the Earth ponies in their strength deliberately caused controlled fires to prevent future spread of wild fire on the earth itself. Without something to burn, the burnt barriers of grassland and wood acted as protection as further or future fires failed to spread with no further fuel to spread. This reduced the damage or even stopped it, sometimes the Earth Ponies controlling it for where they wished to grow particular plants which would eventually become their crops.

The Earth Ponies were the first to produce food instead of relying solely on things they picked and gathered from nature. Agriculture was formed and thus society. And as this continued the Unicorns helped form new innovations and used their magic to assist them further. As the three forms of ponies grew closer and drew on their own strengths to help one another, he found his influence in nature where the ponies resided continue to diminish until he was only able to control it in the Everfree forest and areas outside of Equestria. In the face of adversity and a then unknown force they had banded together. With this the kingdom of Equestria itself had begun to form under the two sisters, famed for their initial removal of Discord. Their own control in nature having been another part of their inspiration in forming society itself.

_Unity_ was their true strength, something much more powerful than their own special talents alone could ever hope to be.

And so Discord watched. And waited.


End file.
